


The Art of Losing

by keren



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Angst, Ed feels the things, Infidelity, Introspection, Multi, Riza Hawkeye is efficient, character assassination of the figurative kind, hurt/comfort maybe, more Break-it than Fix-it, probably
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-25
Updated: 2016-04-25
Packaged: 2018-06-04 11:54:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6656812
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/keren/pseuds/keren
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was a matter of logic that Riza trusted Roy with her life. But maybe she shouldn't have trusted him with their marriage.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Art of Losing

Riza entered the lobby shortly after one. She remained standing there, tense, taking in the high ceilings and tasteful furnishings, for several minutes. There were a few people milling about, but for the most part the place was quiet. She wished irrationally for noise, bustle, perhaps even chaos – yes, she wanted chaos, she worked best in these conditions. But this, this wasn’t work – nor pleasure either.

The reception desk was straight ahead, and once she stopped listening to the storm within she made her way over, walking slowly and deliberately, like a convalescent in the first flush of recovery. She had to sidestep a table atop which a bunch of flowers spilled over the lip of their container, obscuring its delicate design. Their heady scent stayed with her when she reached the fresh-faced receptionist stationed a few feet behind.

“Welcome to the Charter Place Hotel, ma’am. How may we serve you today?” The beaming brightness of her smile invited an answer; Riza remembered in extremis how to pull the muscles of her cheeks into some semblance of a grin. She pulled out her ID card, sliding it over to the woman.

“My husband has a room booked here, under the name Mustang. He asked me to go on ahead and check in.”

The receptionist’s face fell.

“I’m sorry, ma’am, but I don’t think we can check you in just yet. I can phone up and tell them to get to your room first, though, if that’s convenient.”

“Please,” said Riza.

The young woman’s eyelashes fluttered down as she looked to the book of reservations lying open before her. “Mustang, did you say?” A finger slid down the page, paused at a name, and tapped it with a long lacquered fingernail. Riza felt those three little taps like so many stabs in the gut. So there it was. Evidence. She didn’t need to go through with it – she didn’t need to know the whole sordid story; she could get on with the painful business of living in denial – “Oh! But it’s on the first floor. They may very well be done with your room already – If you’ll just excuse me for a moment–”

A minute later, Riza was following a lobby boy – who had looked puzzled at her lack of luggage – up a flight of stairs, down two long corridors. They stopped in front of a door – 114 – which he gallantly opened for her. She nearly forgot to tip him, unused to this kind of place, where people waited on you hand and foot. She often forgot that she had grown up in a cold, squalid monument to alchemy; sometimes it felt as if her entire life had been a series of barracks, army encampments, and more barracks. Then Roy’s home.

Their honeymoon hadn’t taken them to a hotel, either – they had rented an isolated house which crowned a cliff overlooking the sea on one of Aerugo’s quieter coasts, and had spent nearly a week, half-naked, their skin dusted with wind-salt, between their private beach and their bedchamber. The bedroom had been small, alcove-like, rustic, but the bed was wide and the light made orange and blue shadows dance upon the white sheets. The beach had been cold at night, but Roy was very good at lighting fires. And, over the water, or through the open window, the scent of something else, carried across the sea by the great air currents, made Riza dream of travel. Almeria, El-Saahel, Barjavelle… the names of the great cities of the South rolled across her tongue as she whispered them against the skin of Roy’s side, against the bones of his ribcage underneath, and her world shook when he laughed and promised to take her there someday. That whole week, all its tastes, its smells, its sights, was anchored in her memory, and her mind played over it as precisely as a needle in the groove of a record.

The music of the past was startled away by the sound of the door closing behind her. The bellboy had slinked off. She sat down in an armchair that was one of a pair, and looked morosely about the room.

So this was the place. Not the exact place, perhaps – though Roy was a creature of habit, and it wouldn’t surprise her if he had carried that into this part of his life. So perhaps this was the place. She felt her stomach turn to look at the opulent bed on the other side of the room.

Restless, she went over to the window. Havoc had been frantically searching for his pack of cigarettes that morning, but no one even considered that _she_ might have lifted it off his desk. The lighter was Roy’s. It had her father’s array engraved on the side – she wished he wouldn’t leave it in the dish on the living room table. He’d reasoned that he couldn’t carry his gloves with him in their very home, and that the lighter was innocuous enough, hidden there in plain sight, and might come in handy. She resented the thing – not Roy’s decision, which was sound, but the reminder of the destruction they had both wrought long ago, given a place of honour in the middle of their peaceful living room. She atoned enough when she was reminded of it every time Roy put on the gloves – there was no need for that wicked array to follow her home. She didn’t clean her guns at the kitchen table, after all.

Roy saw it differently, she knew. He was an eternal penitent – his idea of self-flagellation was the torture of remembrance, every hour he lived purloined from the lifetimes of others, every breath he took stolen right out of their lungs. He needed to be reminded – at least he thought so. She didn’t think his sins were any greater than hers. She had never had the fortitude to try to convince him of it.

Riza eyed the cigarette that was nearly down to the filter. She became aware that her thoughts were swirling round without ever happening upon their true object – the cause of the storm of feeling inside, and of her presence here. She wouldn’t cry. She had no right.

She hadn’t believed it, at first. For the longest time she hadn’t believed it. Who would, who knew – who _truly_ knew – Roy Mustang? The man was nothing if not loyal. To his ideals, to his team, to his friends. Even now that she was sure, she still believed that. And yet – yet, there she was, in a room he had managed to hide from her notice – _nothing_ ever escaped her notice – waiting for him. And for someone else.

She wanted to run – from the room, from this train of thought. She wanted to go home, or back to work, and pretend that she didn’t know. But now that she had noticed the slight hesitation in his expression before he touched her, the late nights she hadn’t written into his schedule – did he think she wouldn’t _realise_ – the cold spot in their bed when he returned in the early hours of the morning…

She remembered her wedding night, his face serious and yet so gentle when they had laid everything bare for each other. There were few words that night, but his every gesture, his every caress, his every attention had spoken well enough. _You’ve stood at my back all these years_ , they had said. _Now it’s my turn. Equivalent Exchange._

Was that still there, between them? Did Roy still feel that? One horrible thought – had he ever? But no, Roy and Riza had known each other too long to pretend at love. And she had seen the fierceness of his love – he had proven it, time and again, before they even had made anything of it, through his actions rather than his words. He was not a man of a few words – unless these words meant something to him. Then he would jabber on about the budget, the recruitment statistics, or Fullmetal’s mission reports, and speak with only his eyes.

Two weeks spent investigating him – her own _husband_ , for shame, did he know how far she would debase herself for him? In two weeks nothing had turned up, and she had been hopeful. All in my head, she had thought. The old insecurities, from a decade of seeing a new woman on his arm every night. Four years of marriage meant far more than ten of dalliances. She had felt awful about the suspicion.

And then, last night, on his desk, a note hidden amongst many others like it – _take care of_ _transaction slip, CP Hotel_ – in his neat hand. She had spent hours at the kitchen table, long after he’d gone to bed, tracing over the loop of the last l. He wasn’t paying with their joint account – she looked over their transactions every month. She had barely stopped herself from going into the study to check his own account’s records: it was useless, and besides, the drawer creaked; Roy in the next room would have heard it. Instead, she had sat in the kitchen, her mind floating and filling the space, and had caressed the swirls of ink on the flimsy piece of paper.

In the morning, he had kissed the crown of her head like it was nothing – how long since he had kissed her lips, she suddenly wondered –, seeming not to notice how stiff she was, and had said he would be late that evening. Perhaps very late, he added. He was discussing the overhaul of the State Alchemist program with Colonel Gannet. You know how he is. Obsessive attention to detail. Kind of like me? She had asked wryly, not looking at him. Kind of like you, he had replied after a pause, sounding bemused.

It was a good lie. Gannet had indeed been in to ask if he and Roy could have a casual talk about the program sometime – it wasn’t unthinkable that they would have decided on a certain time while she’d been out of earshot. She didn’t _actually_ know everything, after all, just gave a very good impression of it. She’d almost convinced herself again that she was being paranoid. They’d chatted of familiar things over breakfast. Havoc had picked them up at seven-thirty. Once at the office, she had gotten her hands on a list of hotels in Central – and with her heart in her mouth, she had found the Charter Place Hotel.

She spent the next two hours waiting in the hotel room in confusion. There was paperwork to be done in her handbag, and she pulled it out and tried to tune her mind to it. The tumult in her head wouldn’t let her, and besides, she felt like a cliché of herself, doing work at such a time. She put the sheets of paper away and went back to the window with Jean’s cigarettes and Roy’s lighter, and chain-smoked the five cigarettes that were left, watching the people in the street.

Charter Place was in the business district, a fairly well-conserved borough of the older Central that looked therefore nothing at all like Central, and most of the folk below seemed to be businesspeople. When she had been a girl she had thought all grown-ups looked like that, well-dressed and with neat hairdos – in point of fact, the exact opposite of Berthold Hawkeye. She had strived in early adulthood to look and act like them. Then there had been Ishval, and severity and tidiness had become the refuge of routine.

When her throat burned, she left the empty pack on the windowsill and retreated into the room to put away the lighter. Dread overwhelmed her for a moment, and again she longed to flee. To distract herself, she inspected the room thoroughly. It was richly furnished, all sleek ebony with golden trim. The dresser was a masterpiece of marquetry, depicting some kind of woodland scene. Two heavy rugs with dark oriental patterns, thrown over the hardwood floors, marked out the sitting area and the sleeping quarters, which were granted further intimacy by a Xingese folding screen. All expensive, beautiful materials – nothing at all like Roy’s and her home, simple and utilitarian, the home of two soldiers. Two tall windows let the afternoon sun in. As for the bathroom, it was done in glossy black and white mosaic tiles, and at the centre of it a large clawfoot bathtub took pride of place. She hurriedly turned off the bathroom light.

In the end, she went back to the armchair and settled in for the wait.

Sometime around four, she heard them.

Footsteps in the corridor. One heavy, one light. She knew that gait. It stopped right outside the door.

No.

Something made the lock click. _Alchemy,_ she thought numbly. Then remembered distractedly that he could no longer do alchemy. The handle turned. Her body was wracked with a shudder she couldn’t control. The door opened. Behind it was a familiar face.

_No_.

Familiar eyes.

They fell upon her and widened.

“Come in, Edward,” she said, though her own voice sounded as if it was coming from very far away. “Won’t you sit down?”

He had become entirely rigid at the sight of her. His face collapsed into an expression of utter horror.

“R-Riza – oh, god…” he whispered, hoarsely. His eyes darted about for a second; perhaps he was tempted to run for the exit. Then, looking as if he were facing the firing squad, he came over and dropped into the armchair that faced her with a heavy clunking sound. He stared at his own lap. He didn’t try to pretend this was anything else but what it was. The fact that he – and the other members of Roy’s team – had always vaguely believed that she could literally read their thoughts had served her many a time, but she had never imagined she would come to use it in this way.

Edward looked good. Twenty-one years old, the strength of his teenage years still very much present, though he was now possessed of a slightly – _slightly_ – calmer outlook. His hair was longer than it had been when he was fifteen, tied up in a high ponytail. He had gained a few inches, too, though no one would dare comment on it. She couldn’t stand to see him any longer, and turned her gaze to the folding screen behind him.

_Physically_ , she could understand the appeal. On a _deeper_ level-

She wished she hadn’t thought of it.

It was like one of those pictures which looked completely different depending on which point you viewed it from. One second, she hadn’t even considered the idea – in a thousand years she wouldn’t have considered the idea – the next, it had been suggested to her, and had suddenly seemed obvious, a matter of logic.

_Of course_ they worked well together. _Of course_ it couldn’t have been anyone else for Edward. He didn’t trust easily – no more than she or Roy. As far as she knew, his trust was unequally divided between Alphonse, Roy, his teacher, and Winry Rockbell. She had heard there had been something between Edward and Miss Rockbell – she had also heard that it had crashed and burned – but she didn’t know the details.

But how _could_ he – how could _Roy_ – betrayal wasn’t in their _nature-_

“I’m sorry,” he gasped suddenly. “Riza, _I’m so sorry_.”

She finally looked at him. He was struggling not to cry. He’d punched a god in the face, that brave man, and he was struggling not to cry. _She wanted to shoot him_.

She remembered him, eleven years old, broken in half, begging forgiveness for the sin of loving too much.

She remembered him, twelve years old, with the fire of determination in his eyes, two metal limbs and again standing to lose everything that he had built back up, again because he loved too much.

Fifteen – defeat, pain, disillusion.

Sixteen – triumphant, nearly whole. Fully whole, really, because he had done the impossible and wrestled his brother back from a monster she didn’t understand, couldn’t understand, never _wanted_ to understand.

He was _good_ , at his core, and she couldn’t fathom why he had – _say_ it – why he had _done this to her_.

She thought of Edward’s hands – one rough like a soldier’s and one soft like a child’s – upon her husband. Immediately, her mind jumped to _Roy_ ’s hands on _him_. She felt blood rush to her face, though she didn’t know if it was from anger or embarrassment – but her mind was obsessive, would not relent, would not stop torturing her. Roy, shedding the clothes from the golden skin, caressing every place he could reach with his fingers and his lips. Heat – sweat – one silver leg, straining on the cream-coloured sheets she had seen on the bed, and long blond hair – a shade more yellow than anyone else’s – fanning out over the cream-coloured pillow. Kisses to that leg, that brow – whispers into that hair – and a hand confidently – Roy did everything with confidence – dipping lower, lower – was Ed loud in his pleasure? Would Roy be loud, for him, would he speak, as he so seldom did in his marriage bed?

She wouldn’t stop, couldn’t stop, _should_ stop thinking about it. Her hand reached into her bag for the only reassurance that had never failed her, and brought out her gun, which she rested on her lap. She left the safety on, but Edward blanched.

“I’m not going to shoot you,” she said calmly, and thought earnestly of Roy _fucking_ him, and wasn’t sure she was speaking the truth. She did want to shoot him – wanted to open him up to see his entrails, as if she could see there the details of how the man – the _boy_ – had ensnared her husband.

That path was dangerous – and absurd. She knew Edward – had watched him grow up (so had Roy, what a _delightful_ thought) – and, try as she might, furious as she was, she couldn’t see an ounce of guile in him. Not that he was innocent – simply he was incapable of underhandedness. Which left-

“How did it happen?” Riza asked abruptly, and felt her back grow wet with cold sweat. “How did you two-?”

His throat worked – he swallowed uneasily. She saw something warring in his eyes. “Are you sure you wanna…” he paused.

“Hear this? Yes, please, Edward.” She was aware her tone was cold, colder probably than she’d ever been with him. Even when she stopped viewing him as a child – that day in her quarters when she had told him about Ishval like one confesses to a priest – even when she had started to see the young man he had grown into, she had never treated him like a soldier in her command. She was always just a touch softer with him, with both the Elric brothers. She had trusted him because it was hard to think of children as cruel. People often forgot that children were the cruellest of all creatures.

“Well…” his gaze rose, met her eyes, fell into his lap again. He fidgeted – she heard his knee click. He seemed to gather his courage – he had _that_ in spades –, and focused his eyes on her once more. She wondered for a second if she had the right to demand such a thing, then thought, it’s my _husband_ , goddammit.

“It was – the first time, me an’ him were goin’ out for drinks – you remember, after the Promised Day, when we were waiting for Al to be well enough to go back to Resembool-”

Shock washed through her. She straightened in her chair, and, slightly alarmed, he did the same, perhaps subconsciously. It was slightly comical to see him out of his constant slouch.

“ _Edward_ , you were sixteen years old.”

He blushed to the roots of his hair, but replied, in a tone of protest – almost petulance: “I think by then it was a bit of a laugh that I was that – that young, considerin’ all the shit I did before then. He didn’t,” somehow he could turn even redder, “ah, he didn’t, take _advantage_ or anythin’.”

It had probably been his first time – she couldn’t imagine that he had found the time to scrounge up some sexual experience before then. He had spent most of his teenage years racing against some clock only he could hear.

The two weeks the brothers had spent in Central before heading to Resembool had been hectic, but she remembered now that Roy, as soon as he had recovered his sight, had taken it upon himself to drag Edward away from his brother’s bedside for a few hours, night after night.

Roy and Riza hadn’t been together, then. They hadn’t even made overtures. She felt her gut clench. This changed things, somehow.

“Did it happen just once, back then?” Decidedly, she was a sucker for torture.

He bit his lip. “Four times,” he muttered, like a child admitting to a blunder. She blinked her astonishment. “Then we went home, an’ there was the thing with Winry,” he looked vaguely sick for a moment, “then two years in I got news that you two were gettin’ hitched – and, I’unno. I felt – _angry_. At you, at him – it wasn’t your fault or his – ‘m sorry. Anyway, Winry got fed up with me – prob’ly ‘cause of that. An’ I left, and I thought I was gonna remain with her – yanno – not in person, but, like, relationship-wise. I was sure the thing with R- Mustang would jus’ go away if I jus’ could stick with her. But I had to clear my head, so I went out West. Well – you know that. And before I left, I said somethin’ real dumb. To Winry. Whatever.” He took a deep breath. “So I was out West for two years and Al was out East, an’ then we met up in Central and he told me he couldn’t lie, that he was in love with Winry.”

He laughed. It seemed he couldn’t stem the flow of the words, like it was swarming up his throat. Like he, too, was confessing after long years of guilt.

“An’ I said I couldn’t lie, either, and I wasn’t. In love with her I mean. We fought and made up in like two hours – like we do – an’ he went to Rush Valley, which was where Winry was, an’ I guess they sorted it out ‘cause – well. You know. You got your invitation to the wedding.” His eyes widened suddenly. “You better go, by the way, or Winry really _is_ gonna kill me.”

“I will. What happened next?” She had stopped eyeing her gun, and was enraptured by the useless details of Edward’s tale. She didn’t take the time to explain it to herself. She just waited.

“I stayed in Central, an’ I looked for somethin’ to do. An’ then – a couple months in – the military contract.”

Edward had spent months in and out of the office, then, and at twenty, he had been just as loud and energetic as he had been at fifteen, but – more staid. He had smiled more. He’d gone out for drinks with the team, though he was no longer part of it – or the army – in any official sense. He had helped reshape and develop the alchemy research branch – had installed systems of checks and balances, forged a code of ethics, raided and purged the labs.

All the while he’d tiptoed around Roy. She and the team had posited – she wasn’t completely immune to gossip after work – that they were trying to reconfigure their relationship as equals, friends. When she had expressed that notion to Roy, he had looked thoughtful – and told her she was right. Was it some lie, some laughable understatement? Had they been– even then–

Edward ploughed onwards; it seemed he had found his pace, and was trying to get everything out before she shot him. Which she wouldn’t do. Probably.

“Nothin’ – Nothin’ happened, then. I dunno what he was thinking, exactly. I just knew I was gonna let my contract go when I reached the end of it, ‘cause I couldn’t bear to work with him. I felt… things. For him. An’ – with you there, too – I felt guilty. Since it was wrong to – feel the things. So then I got my job at the university.”

He hadn’t stopped going out for drinks with the team after his term as a military contractor had expired, but he had ceased all contact with Roy. That was slightly under a year ago. She had felt disappointed, had thought that Edward was making a mistake letting go of that particular friendship, that he needed the support of someone who understood what he had been through – she’d _urged Roy to go talk to him_. She had _insisted_.

Then that was when _it_ happened. If she hadn’t – if she’d just _let it go_ -

“Riza, are you alright?”

She must have paled. His face was blazing with concern, and the constant undercurrent of guilt she’d heard in his voice from the moment he walked in. She was no stranger to guilt and, for a moment, pitied him.

“Please, go on.” To her own ears, she sounded calmer than she felt, and it seemed to calm him, too. His hands stopped flitting about – touching his hair, the seat of his chair, the top of his automail through his trousers. Instead, they rested at his sides, bracketing his thighs. Younger, he wouldn’t have put himself in a position that hindered his reflexes so. His hands had always hovered, ready to clap at any moment. After the Promised Day, Roy had been much the same, though that had thankfully stopped a few months ago as he finally settled into his power.

“Y’know I got a flat in the Eastern district – they’re callin’ it Myrrha these days – an’ one day, the bast- R- _Mustang_ just shows up on my doorstep, like a goddamn bad penny. I guess he must’ve gotten my new address from the brass.” He’d gotten it from her, actually. “He had some Xingese from ‘roun’ the corner an’ he was askin’ questions ‘bout alchemy – how could I _not_ – anyway, I let him in, but nothin’ happened then, either. Or the few times after that.”

He gulped. It seemed the words failed him for a moment. She prodded him gently, now: “So when did it happen?”

He closed his eyes as if in pain. He looked so _young_.

“A few months ago – we’re outside a pub jus’ – talkin’ about something – I don’t remember what – and. I swear I don’t know who kissed who first. It’s a – goddamn toss-up. But we – we kissed. And then – we went back to my place.”

She felt a shiver run her through, something more like dread or panic than anger or jealousy. _Roy_ – she could see him, outside some bar, hidden under an awning, bending towards Edward – standing close – their faces, close – their hands–

The image terrified her somehow. She motioned wordlessly for Ed to go on, again, to say whatever he had left to say, and he did so almost gratefully, stumbling over his words in his haste to get them out.

“I – after that I tried to stop it, but I’m just as guilty as him, don’t blame him, ‘cause _I_ couldn’t stop it, blame _me_ , don’t blame him. ‘S not his fault. I went to Resembool for a month,” she recalled something like that, two months ago, “an’ I thought I was gonna stay there and leave you two in peace but – but – Al and Winry were _so happy_ and I m _\- missed him_.” Another deep breath. “And. That’s it, I guess. I came back an’,” he shrugged stiffly. “An’ – we got the hotel room.”

When he fell silent, he watched her – she would have smiled at the irony in any other situation – like a hawk. He didn’t add any more apologies, as he would have when he was younger. He just – waited. After a few seconds, he looked away from her steady gaze.

Riza kept eyeing him – the little harmonies of his face, the trim lines of his body, the youthful energy of him. His golden colouring, expressive hands, powerful grace. She had often been caught in the spell of watching him move and fight; even now that he stood immobile under her scrutiny, save for the fluttering of his throat and the nervous roaming of his eyes, he was entrancing. And he was good, too, if not kind, and defiant, animated with the kind of internal fires that drew in pyromaniacs like Roy, just like moths to a flame. She understood.

She _understood._ Somehow, it hurt more, to understand, than being left in the dark would have.

She had seen Edward and Roy together – not as lovers, but as comrades, friends, fellow alchemists. Once they stopped bickering, they worked together like Roy and Riza did, like a well-oiled machine – or perhaps a perfectly-designed array. She knew so many little things about Edward that would have attracted Roy – his penchant for danger, his need to see his own rebellious aimlessness tempered by a sure guiding hand, his desire for an intelligence off of which he could bounce his own genius –

\- and his fear of abandonment.

She almost winced at that parallel. Roy, it seemed, had a type.

Perhaps Edward had fallen in love with Roy out of some disturbing, misplaced longing for his father. She couldn’t blame him; she’d done the same. There was something, in Roy Mustang, that spoke to strays, and said _follow me, and I’ll take care of you for the rest of my life_. She wasn’t proud enough to deny it, but she was certain that touching upon that subject with Edward would quickly make him forget the guilt he felt in relation to her. He would probably either dissolve into a puddle of embarrassment or figure out how to do alchemy again in a fit of rage and seal her into the ceiling. She left that concept aside for later contemplation.

She thought almost idly that she could forgive Edward. She knew she would, someday – it would be much more efficient to do so right away. Her feelings towards Edward’s end of the whole thing were comparatively easy when she measured them to the ugly, rearing _thing_ that _Roy’_ s end inspired in her: they had simple names, like hurt, betrayal, or anger.

But already, a hint of understanding, a smidgen of pity, a smattering of everything she’d ever felt for him since he was twelve years old – compassion, exasperation, concern, _care_. Forgiveness was almost too easy when she considered how close she had been to not having had Roy at all – if he or Edward had been just a little more courageous, a little more open with each other, all those years ago after the Promised Day, she doubted that either of them would have ever stopped helplessly clinging to the other. Roy wouldn’t have – _cheated_ , she could at least _say it_ in her own head – he wouldn’t have cheated if it had been anyone else. Edward had broken through his defences before she ever did, for all she had known him for a decade, and more cleanly than she ever could.

Rebecca, annoyingly enough, had known: “Your Colonel’s hung up on somebody,” she’d said at the very start of it, when Roy had indeed still been a Colonel. “You probably shouldn’t marry him.” She had laughed _that_ off effortlessly – _Roy Mustang_ , who went through women like Havoc went through cigarette brands, was certainly not _hung up_ on anyone.

Well.

He wasn’t hung up on any _woman_ , apparently.

She imagined there would be a divorce, now. She couldn’t wrap her head around it – a divorce meant so much more between she and Roy than it would have meant for a normal couple. It was a cleaving, a renunciation of something far bigger than the two of them, a repudiation of a dream so profound it had consumed her entire life while she wasn’t looking – wasn’t it? Could they make it so it would not be that?

She didn’t know if it was possible for them to turn Amestris into a peaceful state when they couldn’t even keep the peace in their own marriage.

Across from her, Edward appeared to be pondering similarly dark prospects. The crease between his eyebrows she knew very well – it hadn’t changed in ten years. The two of them were such a pair, she thought, almost with fondness; they were both pretending that there was a reason for them to sit here after all had been said that could be said, except for the need they seemed to sense for a conclusion – a closing of the circle.

Then, of course, _when_ else – they both heard it – the key slide into the lock.

There was a click – the lock was already opened. A pause. Then the handle turned, and Roy stood in the threshold.

He was weary, and wan – but he didn’t look surprised when he saw the two of them sitting there. Just – grim. He must have noticed her absence at the office, and he must have guessed that only something serious would keep her away from work. He would have been thinking about this for months – would have obsessively contemplated the idea that they would be discovered – and so he would have jumped to the right conclusion straight away.

“Edward,” he said. “Riza.”

Her mouth went dry as powder.

He came into the room, came to stand beside the armchair where Edward was sitting.

Presenting a united front.

Edward couldn’t seem to take his eyes off of him. Roy made sure not to touch him in front of her – none of the casual pats on the shoulder she had seen them exchange so many times – and she thought he was right not to. She didn’t know herself today. She didn’t know what she might do.

Riza felt as if she were dying, to look at the two of them side by side. She grabbed the nearest thing – her reassurance, her _toy_ – and raised it steadily.

He stood tall and ramrod-straight, her husband, her friend, her General, and looked calmly at the gun pointed at him.

“You can shoot me,” he said, “but please don’t do it in front of him.”

Her gaze remained fixed on him. In the corner of her eye she saw Edward make some kind of aborted movement.

She brought the gun down in annoyance. “Don’t be absurd, of course I’m not going to shoot you.” Then she added, vindictively, because she had the _right_ – “How is Colonel Gannet?”

“Riza,” he said, and what pierced her to the core was that she had heard this exact voice, this exact _conciliatory_ tone when she’d stood beside his chair at the Council of Generals. “I made a terrible mistake. I’m sorry I hurt you.”

“Was the mistake sleeping with Edward,” she asked coldly, “or marrying me?”

That had the benefit of making him fall silent. As long as she conserved her ability to excise what he meant from what he said – _cutting the bullshit_ , was Edward’s term – she could keep the higher ground. If she allowed herself to listen – to see him as he was, as she had loved him – then she would do something insane. Like forgive him.

Like let him go.

“Why don’t you sit down?” she asked. There were only two chairs in the room; he perched on the arm of Edward’s seat. The young man had been silent for a while now. His eyes followed Roy closely, darting away for a few seconds now and then to look at her. It seemed he gleaned something from her face, and her words. She had never before been subjected to the intense scrutiny of his intelligent gaze; she found that she hated it.

“Were you planning on ever telling me?” she asked. “Or was it classified information available only to the upper ranks?” What that meant was: how far have I been demoted in your esteem? Am I nothing more to you than one of your foot soldiers, now?

He understood what she said; he, too, could read her like an open book.

“God, Riza, no. I didn’t know _how_ to tell you. Sometimes I feel like I’ve spent my whole life just – hurting you, again and again. Edward – he said he’d do it if I wouldn’t. He couldn’t stand the lying.” He snuck a glance to the blond beside him and hurriedly looked away at the glare he found there. He rubbed his face into his hands, like he always did after a long day at the office. He looked so tired, so sad.

“Edward is cleverer than the both of us combined,” she said, taking her time. “Not that I think I was a fool for trusting you; but I’ll start thinking it soon if you don’t _stop being an idiot_.” Her words cracked through the room like a whip – a sudden gunshot. It was rare that she raised her voice; she usually didn’t need to.

“What do you-?”

“I will have honesty from you, Roy Mustang, and _don’t you dare_ speak to me like I’m one of your Colonels.” She was that, of course. Colonel Riza Mustang. Perhaps not for much longer.

He eyed her in amazement; she could tell the idea of outright expressing his emotions pained him. She cared not at all, except that if he wouldn’t do so now, at the crucial moment, she didn’t think she could speak to him ever again. Which, if nothing else, didn’t bode well for the state of Amestris.

“If you don’t fuckin’ _talk_ , Mustang, I’m gonna let her shoot you.”

Perhaps it had been insecurity that had made her picture what Roy had with Edward as some kind of perfect romance; perhaps it had been the unclear cast of her thoughts in her distress. Either way, she couldn’t fathom how she had ever forgotten that Edward was always unflinchingly frank, and demanded the same thing from others with the exacting resolve that characterised him. Their relationship wouldn’t be any more perfect than the one she had with Roy – but it would, for as long as it lived, remain something wholly _honest_.

She was unsurprised when he complied with Ed’s demand, and wasn’t fooled into thinking that it was a delayed response to hers. Now that she knew, it was too easy to remember how often Roy ceded to Ed, how often Ed cut through Roy’s masks like a diamond blade.

Now he took a deep breath to steady himself, shut his eyes so he could pretend some more, and started to speak.

“You and I, Riza – what we had – what we _have_ – is more than I have ever deserved. It’s something I respect profoundly. I owe you so much of myself – my life, of course, several times over, my sanity… for many years, my focus and my happiness – and my rank, it goes without saying. I can’t ever repay you, and I want to owe you always, so you’ll never stop – hounding me,” a hint of the old sarcasm, wonders never ceased, “but – you’re right. It was a mistake for us to get married. I knew that someday Ed would come between us – he wouldn’t even need to be present – just the idea of him would have been enough.”

It was as if Riza’s breath had been cut from her lungs. When she had thought of their marriage, before, she had worried that it was a distant thing, a cold thing. But she and Roy had never been distant as long as they’d known each other. Far from it.

They had tried too hard to know each other – not to know how the other felt, or thought – not to _understand_ each other – but to _know_ the other, to possess him, to consume her. To break through the membrane that must necessarily exist between two human beings and to take residence in each other’s ribcages. They had come close, too – the cores at the centre of them vibrating in unison, echoing, orbiting closer, closer – until it was either break apart, or become one. Merge. Let yourself be diluted in another.

Another word for it must have been death.

The thing was – even with how Roy and Edward were – she could trust them not to repeat that mistake, and not to carry it on to its bitter end. In the past, they had both tried their hand at flying too close to the sun, but for all that they were scientists, they had always treated each other – even when Ed was just a child – as mysteries that were better left unsolved. They were to each other the vast void that human science knew it would never be able to cover, the void where poetry was born as an offering made in stead of an explanation, the black hole into which human knowledge sunk, beyond the event horizon.

Thinking of where that left her, she felt a second of hopelessness. Once Roy had been useless in the rain – and so she’d been useful, guarding that blind spot, that Achilles’ heel, from his too-numerous enemies. Now, though, that he could dry the gloves with a clap – that he barely needed even them anymore – what good was she?

The glut of words hung heavy in the air between the three of them, like a page where the heavy annotations in the margins spilled over onto the text, like a report from the Fullmetal Alchemist. There was nothing more to be said. Everything that hadn’t been said aloud had been read well enough by all parties, between the lines.

Riza stood, unhurriedly taking up her coat and bag. “Thank you,” she said, “for being honest.”

Roy nodded. Edward peered into her eyes with his wolf’s stare and saw far too much, as usual.

As she made to leave, she reflected that it had been true, what she and Roy had. She had teetered on the edge of doubting it, for a second, for a painful breath, but the bond between them, entwined around a third person now, had strained, but withstood. It wasn’t over, as long as they both lived. Theirs had been a marriage of minds, of wills, forged in the fires of their own personal hell. Riza had been a fool to think such a bond could be moulded into something like a fireside romance, and Roy had been a fool, too.

It was far too painful, far too serious a thing. The rivers of blood which united the two of them forever in their currents also divided them in the crucial matters of the heart. Their shared past built trust – comradeship – a deep mutual understanding – but over the ruins of Ishval it could not build a family home.

It was different with Edward – he and Roy were two sinners who saw the other’s sin as a forgivable offense. For Edward, Roy had been a weapon at the hands of cruel monsters, while he had wilfully wrought his own brother’s destruction. For Roy, Edward’s sin was justified – was never really a sin in the first place, when it had stemmed from deep abiding filial love and grief. He viewed himself less favourably, and what he had done Riza had done also, on a smaller scale. He forgave her for it unconditionally (like he had forgiven Hughes, like he would never forgive himself) but could not forget.

And Edward, she knew, could make anyone forget anything, that there had been blood spilled in the past, that hard toil lay ahead, that there were things in human nature that would forever remain hopeless and petty; he did it like he had done alchemy, one quick clap erasing the damage, through sheer force of will. His will for years had been like a relentless battering ram, knocking upon a door she could only understand as the barest of concepts, until he had turned around and made another door vanish and hope spring anew. It seemed he was making a habit of that, now.

If Roy would have her, then she would have him, too, as they once had been, before they confusedly sought to complete a bond that was already whole. The Flame Alchemist and the Hawk’s Eye. Roy Mustang and Riza Hawkeye.

Marriage was overrated, anyways.

“Riza, wait!” Roy cried out. She paused, her fingers skimming the handle of the door, and turned back to him. She took in the beloved face, the tousled hair, the dark fathomless eyes, one last time, and told herself to enjoy it while it was there, or rather – while it was hers.

“Yes?” she asked, when several seconds had passed in silence.

“Are you leaving?” She noticed what he hadn’t asked, because she always noticed everything: _are you leaving me?_ He sounded as if he was fighting for every word to come out. Beside him, Edward looked drawn. He fixed her with his headlight-bright eyes, and it was he she looked at when she answered.

“I’m rather certain our marriage is over.” Roy’s features seemed to deepen in sorrow. “That said – Amestris isn’t a democracy yet.”

His expression turned to utter incomprehension. She had always been able to tell when he was faking confusion – he did it often enough – and felt somewhat glad she still could.

“She means, you still haven’t paid her her dues, asshole,” Ed said, and they exchanged another look, he and she. Something determined, something wilful, something kind of begrudging but also understanding, passed between them. I’m fine, thought Riza. I can do this. At least it’s Edward. At least – at least he’ll – it’ll be fine.

“You’ll – stay?” said her husband.

“You still have a promise to uphold,” a flicker of a smile, “ _asshole_.”

And with that, she swiftly turned on her heel and closed the door behind her. “I know you’re thinking it right now,” she could hear Ed saying as she leaned on the wall right outside room 114, trying to calm down her beating heart and willing her eyes to dry, “but you _really_ don’t deserve Hawkeye.”

Then, before she could hear Roy’s voice and really break down in the middle of a hotel corridor, she swiftly paced away. She took to the stairs slowly, at first, and felt as if she were gradually becoming unburdened with every step – away from room 114.

When she reached the lobby, she felt strong, or strong enough that she thought it was the truth this time, when she told herself _I’ll be fine. So will Roy._

_So will Ed._

She made her way towards the gilded doors which would let her out into Charter Place.

“Good evening, Mrs. Mustang,” said the receptionist as she passed by. Riza paused in front of her.

“Actually,” she said, bright and brittle, “I’m trying out my maiden name again. Hawkeye. What do you think?”

The young woman on the other side of the desk looked puzzled, but she recovered quickly, a consummate professional.

“It’s very nice, Ms. Hawkeye. A fierce name.”

“Thank you,” she replied. “I think I missed it.”

**Author's Note:**

> Ach!
> 
> It can't just be me that writes a fic in just one or two bursts, and then sits there going, "why the fuck did I write this?" I hate this fic. Seriously, I hurt myself here. I love Riza so much. It's a bit hypocritical to publish it since I hate it so much, but so what: I'm a hypocrite. Truth is, I haven't written fiction for like four or five years, and I've _never_ finished a fic, in my _life_ , so I do kind of want to publish it anyway. Sense of accomplishment or something. 
> 
> So what this means is that I've barely looked it over; hope there aren't too many mistakes or incoherences.
> 
> Couple notes: Gannet was lifted from wikipedia, it's some kind of military... equipment (I can't find it anymore, Google just shows me pictures of birds, whatever).
> 
> Almeria is a city in Spain; El-Saahel is a bastardisation of the Sahel, the place where the Sahara meets the savannah; Barjavelle is another bastardisation of a French science fiction author's name, Barjavel. So yeah, I'm full of shit.
> 
> The title (and a bit in the actual fic) is taken from Elizabeth Bishop's poignant 'One Art', quoted here for your convenience: 
> 
> The art of losing isn’t hard to master;  
> so many things seem filled with the intent  
> to be lost that their loss is no disaster. 
> 
> Lose something every day. Accept the fluster  
> of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.  
> The art of losing isn’t hard to master. 
> 
> Then practice losing farther, losing faster:  
> places, and names, and where it was you meant  
> to travel. None of these will bring disaster. 
> 
> I lost my mother’s watch. And look! my last, or  
> next-to-last, of three loved houses went.  
> The art of losing isn’t hard to master. 
> 
> I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,  
> some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.  
> I miss them, but it wasn’t a disaster. 
> 
> —Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture  
> I love) I shan’t have lied. It’s evident  
> the art of losing’s not too hard to master  
> though it may look like ( _Write_ it!) like disaster.
> 
> ...
> 
> Thanks for reading!


End file.
